AG has had long enough

Friday

Jan 31, 2014 at 3:15 AM

The investigation into suspended Rockingham County Attorney James Reams is starting to make the state Attorney General’s Office look like “The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot straight,” a 1971 comedy film based on Jimmy Breslin book by the same name.

On Nov. 6, Reams was suddenly jettisoned from his county office and suspended from his duties as county attorney based on an investigation lacking much detail.

Since then Reams has made several attempts, including petitioning the court, to shine the light of day on the AG’s investigation. But to little avail.

Then early this week the case got more curious. Reams was asked by the Rockingham County’s legislative delegation to help develop the coming year’s budget for the department from which Reams has been barred.

When asked about the inclusion of the suspended Reams in budget discussions, Rep. Kenneth Weyler, R-Kingston, vice chairman of the county legislative delegation’s executive committee, told reporters he didn’t think a temporary county official should be handling the office’s fiscal year budget.

He was referring to interim Rockingham County Attorney James Boffetti, who had initially been scheduled for the budget work, then at the eleventh hour, called off without explanation.

Despite his suspension, some members of the county delegation have continued to support Reams while noting they have also been kept in the dark.

So much so is the case that one county official told a television interviewer the AG’s office never formally notified the delegation of Reams’ suspension. The inference being that the county was legally able to sit down with Reams for a budget talk.

What we have seen from the AG’s office is nothing new. They label something an “ongoing investigation.” Meanwhile the accused and those around them are hung out to dry by all the speculation.

At this point there is nothing of substance indicating Reams has done anything illegal. Questions seem to center around a forfeiture account — money seized while investigating drug crimes — and how those funds have been used.

Reams’ office had chosen to parcel those funds to the benefit of local law enforcement.

There also seems to be interest in reimbursements Reams received for attending work-related conferences, for which he says there is documentation.

Unsettling among the questions surrounding his suspension are allegations of sexual impropriety of some kind. We use the word unsettling because, as everyone knows who reads the news understands, such actions run the gamut from a harassing joke to an offense that can earn someone many years in jail.

Nothing we write here is in any way to prejudge Reams. Rather it is to urge the AG’s office to end the speculation.

Given the way state officials swooped in unannounced, apparently to anyone at the county level, we have to believe the investigation has been moving ahead full-bore. And that if the AG’s office has been doing its job, nearly three months of investigation must have yielded something of substance the public — and certainly Reams — should know.

Justice, by definition, should be swift and fair.

As of this writing we can attest to neither. And apparently neither can Reams nor the county delegation which sought budgetary counsel from its longtime county attorney.

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Not to break faith with her office’s silent treatment of the case, Associate Attorney General Jane Young has reportedly declined to comment on whether Reams should have been allowed to participate in the meeting. She did say, however, that Attorney General Joseph Foster only revoked Reams’ authority as a prosecutor — an odd move should Reams be guilty of anything untoward as the county attorney.

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